Page 31 of Generation Omega: Revealed
The Russian moves nearer, warily watching me. “We could cook an egg on your face.”
“We might too, but not until you’re dead,” the Irishman adds with disturbing enthusiasm. “Do you really not feel it?”
A quick self-assessment reveals that I feel completely fine, though my mood has been better. While I work on the zip tie, I mutter, “Nope.”
The American glances at the Russian. “We could hit him with a hammer, couldn’t we? That won’t burn us.”
“Notyet.”
Great, they’re going to hit me with a hammer before or after they cook a meal on my face. This day just can’t get stranger. It’s definitely time to stop grousing about the substandard quality of my adversaries and begin some serious problem-solving.
“I have money.” It’s useless to offer, but it would be odd if I didn’t.
They all snort in my direction, as expected.
“I wouldn’t mind the money,” the Irishman says, “if I’m being honest. But it’s not really yours to give anymore, not with what’s happening to your accounts right now. Your money is now ours. Thanks a million.”
That’s inconvenient, but not a pressing concern right now. “What do you want from me?” I give my words a dose of actual and authentic concern, while I consider my situation.
“We want the location of the omega,” the American says.
“I can’t help you. I don’t know the location of any omegas.”
But that’s a lie and, when my head finally clears, my heart pounds like a beacon calling to her. In strange, impossible reverberations, I feel her heart answer. If I were free, I’d already be moving toward her. Nothing would stop me. The pull is irresistible, which is why she’s coming to me. She can’t stop herself. Biology, drive, compulsion, fulfillment, desire, connection. The omega legacy is living and breathing in us, and these men want to destroy it. They want to destroy Tillie.
The earth below me might as well be trembling the moment I feel her moving closer. She’s just outside this building. I shudder when I feel his hand on her—the boyfriend. He’s with her. Why isn’t he stopping her? It’s a trap. All of it is a trap.
The SWAT team was a decoy. I’m the bait, and these thugs don’t actually care what I know about the omega. All these lazy fucks have to do is wait for their prey to arrive, because she can’t deny the instinct leading her to her death. She probably doesn’t know who I am and yet she knows she belongs to me and with me, and that our fates are now joined.
I don’t mean to be critical but the omega legacy has some serious flaws when an omega can’t prioritize her own self-preservation over reaching an alpha used as a lure to end her life. But I’ll deal with that oversight later. Right now, I just need tonotbe the alpha that gets my omega killed.
Tillie’s heartbeat is strong and growing even stronger as she nears me. Pride blossoms inside me, so powerfully I can’t help but smile, which is probably disconcerting for my assailants. Gagged men rarely smile and the look is not my best. But Tillie’s courage is incredible. She’s facing this sudden disruption of her life with a kind of force that surprises me. I don’t know her yet, who she was before she met me. I want to—I want to know everything about her. I will know everything, just as soon as we survive today.
“Check outside,” the Russian commands to the others, who immediately comply. “Your life is about to end, so smile while you can.”
I’m suddenly annoyed with the gag for a new reason. It prevents me from delivering the perfect quip for a moment like this, so instead, I show him the live-action version of my wit. I put an image in my head, this man’s hands on my omega, and I jerk my wrists. The zip tie is history and I’m on my feet, grasping the chair and using it as a weapon.
I’ve played this scene before and, like a dance, I beat this Russian into the ground, with a wonderful array of grunts, cries, and gasps as accompaniment. The Irishman is drawn by the siren’s call of violence and I crack his skull when he’s barely a foot inside the room. Two down, one to go. On some level, I realize I’m the most unhinged person who’s ever lived—an alpha with an omega to protect. But hey, the dead guys chose to battle biology and biology answered.
I rip the gag away and roar when I feel the third man’s hand on Tillie. But then I hear his shriek and I realize that he didn’t touch her. She touched him, jabbing his eyes with her burning skin. That’s my crafty omega. I rush out of the room and turn the corner, witnessing her boyfriend ending the third man with an abrupt neck-crushing jerk, while wearing an oven mitt on one hand.
The savagery I feel in my core is mirrored in the boyfriend’s eyes, but he’s not her alpha. He didn’t need biology to build the kind of love he’ll protect at all costs. Part of me, the possessive, decidedly alpha part, balks at their connection, but the effect of his presence on her is undeniable.
When my full attention moves to Tillie, there’s pleading in her eyes, as her heart whispers its deepest truth—she loves this man beyond reason, trusts him like no other,needshim like oxygen. I will give her everything she needs, which means he’s now mine to protect. Like a necessary structure locking into place, I accept my role in all of this, even without understanding what it is.
Tillie’s delicious scent is all around her. My heart thrums for her and her heart answers, her gorgeous blue-grey eyes filling with relief and a little swoony glow as she looks up at me. “It’s really you,” she breathes.
I smile in answer. “Yes, Tillie, it’s me.”
She beams at me from within her hoodie. “You remember my name.”
“It’s the only name that will ever matter to me.” I want to grab her and never let her go, but I’m still an alpha with an omega to protect. “We can’t be here. They want to kill us and this was too easy. There will be more and we’re nowhere near safe.”
She nods, leaning toward me without realizing it. “I had to reach you.”
“I know. I’m sorry they got me before I fully understood the stakes.”
Her quivering hand reaches toward me, the one not holding the oven-mitted hand of her boyfriend. Forcing myself to observe him, I instantly realize she’s burning him through the mitt and he hasn’t and won’t release her, no matter how much pain he has to endure.
